Fire on the Frontline

by Trevor Wyatt

  “Captain, please come to the CNC,” the communications officers voice comes through the intercom. “There’s something you should see.”

  I compose myself before walking into the CNC.

  “Captain in the CNC!” roars one of the three security personnel stationed in the CNC.

  “At ease, everyone,” I say aloud.

  Commander Ashley is at her station. She winks at me, and I nod back. I walk straight to the captain’s chair and I sit in it.

  Memories surge in my mind. For a moment, I am overwhelmed. I manage to take control of these memories and force them to the back of my mind. Then I bring my erratic emotions under control.

  I look up at the communications officer.

  “What is the matter, Commander?”

  “We just received a priority message, sir,” he says. “It’s sent directly to us, but it’s also broadcasting across all frequencies.” He turns to look at me. “It means everyone can hear what the message says.”

  “Where is the message from?” I ask.

  “It appears to originate from somewhere within the Tyreesian space,” the communications officer says.

  “Greer…” I mutter.

  “Put it on the screen,” I order.

  “Aye, sir,” he says and returns his attention back to his workstation.

  Soon after, a firm looking Greer appears on the screen.

  “I speak on behalf of the Tyreesian collective when I say this. The Galactic Council will fall. The Tyreesian collective is an enemy to this Council and does not support it in any way. We hereby issue a warning to every race that is a signatory to the unholy pact, stay away from Tyreesian space. We will view any and every ship that enters our space as a provocation and we will destroy it with immediacy.

  “And to you, Vice Admiral…or should I say Captain Jeryl Montgomery. You may have succeeded in this round, but don’t get comfortable. This is far from over.”

  The Tyreesian vanished from the screen, plunging the CNC into silence.

  Everyone turns to look at me.

  I heave a loud sigh. Then flash a smile. “Well, at least they got the memo about my new command.”

  The CNC erupts into laughter.

  “What are we going to do about that message?” Ashley asks. “This is an obvious threat to our sovereignty as a people as well as the integrity of the Galactic Council.”

  “Yes, sir,” says the science officer. “I agree with the First Officer. This threat is an act of war. We have to respond in kind.”

  “In kind?” I ask.

  “Yes,” the science officer replies with a straight face. “We have to send a strongly-worded message saying we will not be bullied or subjugated by the Tyreesians and that any attack whatsoever upon any of our vessel will see us bringing the full might of the Armada and the combined military of the Galactic Council to bear on the Tyreesian home world.”

  “True,” I say. “But that’s above my pay grade. We have a one month patrol mission. Why not focus on that and leave the message to the Admirals back at Armada command?”

  This is where the science officer cracks a smile. Relief washes through.

  “Aye, sir,” he says.

  CNC can tell I don’t really give a shit about Greer. Let someone else handle it.

  I want to explore space. Find peace.

  “Is course set for the border?” I ask.

  “Aye, sir,” the navigations officer replies. “FTL is primed and ready. On you go.”

  I sigh.

  Such a good feeling.

  “Go,” I say.

  Homefront

  A Pax Aeterna Novel

  Shadow Agent Chronicles Book 1

  By Trevor Wyatt

  Copyright 2017 by Pax Aeterna Press

  All rights reserved

  This is a work of fiction. All names, characters, places and incidents either are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events or persons is entirely coincidental. This work intended for adults only.

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  No-One

  The alleyway between the twin fifty-story buildings facing the lab provides cover for me. The three-lane road cutting the space between the twin towers and the lab stretches through the heart of the Industrial Estate, which is the commercial and political heart of Sonali Prime. As such, the road is heavily trafficked by cars, Sonali and a sprinkle of humans and other species.

  On Sonali Prime, there are still primitive land-based vehicles, like rovers and bikes, which are used for short distances travels. These primitive vehicles are also used by the poor. Poverty is as much a problem on Sonali Prime as it is on Earth. You’d think a government that could send its people to the stars would extinguish poverty as it went into space. But no, that’s not the case here.

  It’s late in the afternoon, and I’m standing closer to the structure on the left, my eyes kept peeled on the two-story building that houses the research lab I’m going to be sharing with the xenoarchaeologist, Gresh.

  For the past few days that I’ve been on Sonali Prime, establishing my presence and cover, I’ve been going over the information we have on Gresh. All it says is that he is a renowned xenoarchaeologist who publicly supports the Origin Movement, which is dubbed Anti-Ascension in some quarters. Today, I’m going to meet him for the first time and get a feel of who he really is and not just what his dossier says.

  I find the Origin Movement to be a very fitting name. Aside from the fact that it’s a cool way to address Gresh and his fellow free-thinking Sonali friends, it also hints at the reason for the whole ruckus that engulfed Sonali Prime since the “Arrival of Terrans”, an issue for which I’ve been sent to the Sonali homeworld to spy on them.

  I scoff in my hiding spot. I know I haven’t been exactly as efficient as I was during the war against the Sonali. Believe me; no one knows that better than I do. Nevertheless, I don’t see how sending me to this fucking boring mission is a good use of my skills. I should be at the front of the Galactic Council formation, collecting information concerning just how powerful Tyreesian Collectives’ matter transportation technology is, and not watching some scientists that don’t want to go through puberty.

  I squint my eyes in mild disgust, before pushing the thought out of my mind. A good agent doesn’t let her emotions get in her way. I may not like my current babysitting mission, but I shouldn’t let that affect my opinion of Gresh. Otherwise, it would influence the way I speak to him, as well as my actions, and maybe—just maybe—even blow my cover.

  I’ve decided to get the job done here on Sonali Prime. Gather all the information the Armada Intelligence Service could ever need. Prove to those bastards that I haven’t lost my edge. Then right before they want to make their way into their good favors again, I’ll stick it to them hard. I am not called No. 1 in Armada Intelligence for no reason.

  I know I could’ve fought the assignment. I just didn’t. Not now. A good solider knows when to fight and when to bow down. The war is a long one. I don’t have to win every goddamn battle as long as the war is won. I am very patient…Oh, and I never forget. Never…

  “Who goes there!” bursts a thick voice behind me.

  I freeze for a moment, my mind running the possibilities. Who could be behind me? How did they sneak up on me? Is he an assassin? If he’s an assassin, why give away his position?

  I slightly push away from the side of the building and inch towards the center of the alleyway, so the light from the road covers my form by flooding the Sonali’s eyes.

  “Who are you and what are you doing hiding here?” the voice asks, getting closer by the second.

  I hear the Sonali’s footsteps as he approaches.

  I don’t respond. I’m wearing an atmospheric regulator on my face—even though I don’t really need it. The nanites coursing through my veins can help me breathe, along
with a host of other things it can do. But no one knows I have them. And I really don’t see the need of letting the whole world (or worlds…) know, ergo an atmospheric regulator, which I use to hide my face.

  Now, if I speak, the Sonali behind me, which I am assuming is security, will have a record of my voice which they can run through a voice analyzer. They may come up empty since I’ve not had my true voice recorded by the Sonali security department. They would have my voice recorded as a cop assailant with what I’m about to do to this Sonali. I can live with that—I wouldn’t be a great spy if I couldn’t. But it’ll be like living in a tent filled with flies. It’ll be a damn inconvenience.

  Of course, I’ll choose ease over inconvenience, every time. But that’s not what you’ll see in the holovids. In the vids, the lady spy would turn and say a cool line, and then maybe the Sonali gets off a round, which she so conveniently dodges before pulling out her weapon and getting off a shot that drills a hole in the middle of the Sonali’s eye.

  “Turn around!” yells the Sonali.

  I turn around. I know the light will still hide my face, so why resist?

  The Sonali, however, is visible for me to see. From his uniform, I confirm that he’s a security personnel. Probably patrol. I look through the Spartan alleyway all the way to the end, which is about the length of a block. I see a hovering security air car. I blink my right eye, mentally calling the scanning control of my nanites. The world turns a very bright orange hue in my right eye and a grid overcast upon it.

  The Sonali before me appears as a deep red. There are also deep reds all over the place, signifying other life forms. But there’s none in the car. I blink my right eye again, canceling the scanning protocol.

  The world is normal again.

  The Sonali police officer is alone. I’m sure he was flying by when he spotted me leaning nefariously on the side of the building.

  “You’re wearing a regulator,” he says. “So, you’re an alien.” Then with a twist in tone from confrontational to sheer hate. “You must be a Terran, for your stature. A female, I would guess.”

  I notice he hasn’t pulled out his weapon yet. He doesn’t see me as a threat. I almost scoff at his colossal misjudgment.

  “Are you here to bomb the towers?” he continues, taking a step towards me with each word. “Is that your mission?”

  When he’s within range, I mentally call up my voice modifier.

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” I say in a transmogrified voice.

  The slits on this Sonali widened impossibly, and I see raw fear pass through his eyes as I jab against his throat and have him grabbing his neck and gasping for air. I slam my booted foot into his right knee, hearing the bone crack and feeling the muscle tear.

  The Sonali screams and collapses to the ground.

  Still gasping for air, he grabs his communicator. “Officer under attack. Assailant is a suspected, female alien wearing an atmospheric regulator.”

  I knock him out with a punch smack in the head.

  I pull up to my full height.

  “That ought to teach you not to mess with a girl,” I say in my transmogrified voice. “We Drupadi women are tough as old boots.”

  I’m not a Drupadi, and neither am I disguised as a Drupadi. But the operators at the Sonali Security Ops Center who are still listening in through the cop’s active comm unit don’t know that. They’ll probably now be recording the “suspected female alien wearing an atmospheric regulator” as Drupadi

  Soon, they’ll dispatch a retinue of cops to begin canvassing the area. I can’t have them searching for a Terran when I’m going to be in the opposite building from the crime scene.

  It appears that attacking a cop in Sonali is a grave crime as it is on Earth or New Washington. I want them to narrow their search to the Drupadi, who number in the hundreds on Sonali Prime, especially the Capital Grid. That way, when they come into the lab on the other side of the road scanning, they’ll overlook a little ol’ Terran like me.

  Better the Drupadi than the Terrans.

  Oh, and I have nothing against the Drupadi. I’m just putting to practice what I learned in Evasive Techniques class back at the “non-existent” Terran spy academy.

  I dust off my jumpsuit for no reason, other than the dramatic feeling I’m having. Then I walk across the road up to the two-story building. It looks really old and out of place in the whole futuristic line up along the road. For one, it’s the only building in the area that’s less than ten stories in the air. Also, it looks like it’s made out of very dark red brick and mortar. Up on the first floor are huge panes of glass that are blurred by what appears to be dust and dirt, like you’d find in an abandoned warehouse off in a remote colony.

  There are small stone steps that lead up to an old-fashioned swinging door. I walk up to it and knock politely. I feel an urge to scan the building, but I don’t. I don’t know if I’m currently being scanned by the security operatives within the lab. I won’t be caught if I’m not actively using my nanites.

  I knock again.

  “Come in, please!” comes a very light and thin voice.

  I grip the handle, pull it down, and push the door inwards. I walk into a musty hallway. Light from outside falls into the hallway, lighting up a path that reveals floating dust particles. The rug is brown and visibly sandy.

  I look around, to the doors on the left and right, and conclude that this is an abandoned building. So much for security operatives.

  “Up here!” comes the same childlike voice.

  I wonder if he’s Gresh’s son or relative. But why would he be speaking with such assertiveness in his voice?

  I close the door behind and make my way up the stairs on the right. I walk into a wide, open space with shelves upon shelves of books, artifacts of all forms and kinds on stands and tables that are well articulated. At the center is a cluster of equipment and about three workstations with computers. Workstations are arranged in a concentric pattern around the cluster of equipment.

  A manly Sonali figure is standing over some archeological dig up on a table to the left side, near the panes of glass. He has a book in his hands, and he’s engrossed in what he’s reading by the dim lights from the panes.

  I clear my throat as I approach him.

  He looks up at me only when I’m within range. He blinks at me for a while as though he has no idea why I’m here. Then he smiles, revealing a perfect set of white teeth that are almost gorgeous.

  “I’m Gresh,” he says, sticking out a right hand for a handshake. “You must be the xenoarchaeologist expert from New Washington?”

  I take his hand and nod with a smile, which he can see through my transparent breather.

  “I’m Rosaline,” I say, telling him my alias. “I’m excited to work with you.”

  The Sonali only chuckles innocently.

  I really am babysitting, aren’t I?

  No-One

  “Hold on, one second,” Gresh says in his frail voice. He returns to scanning the book he has in his hands against the ever-dimming sunlight through the dirty glass windows paneling of the entire upper area of the building.

  He leaves me to stand awkwardly beside him, wondering how a male of any species could have such an undeveloped voice. I’ve never seen it in any of the many worlds I’ve been to. Of course, I was told that though Gresh was past the age for Ascension, he had chosen to postpone it.

  Based on what I’ve read on my mission files, The Ascension is indeed a big deal on the Sonali culture. Even though every Sonali is born with a gender, by the age of 18 in Terran years, they’re supposed to attend a ceremony—The Ascension—and have their genders switched. I read that this is also the only way for a Sonali to become fertile.

  So based on this Sonali physiology, Gresh should have become a woman by now. The fact that he has not gone through Ascension means that his body continued to develop as a male. But it made him a sterile male, not a fertile woman.

  I don’t know why Gresh
postponed it for himself, though I have my speculations. Maybe, it was as a result of the war efforts. Maybe he just wasn’t in town when he arrived the age.

  Or, maybe he just wasn’t up to doing it.

  So, yeah, I know I’m essentially meeting a highly intelligent adult in the body of a teenager—as per Sonali standards. Even though his body mass has built up with time and he has muscles like any other Sonali male his age would have, I suspect some parts of his physiology remain unchanged, his voice for one. Unlike the cop I shanghaied in the alley away across the street from the building.

  Now, that one has a manly voice.

  I take a few steps away from the Sonali scientist and scan the room again.

  The top floor is the main lab, while the ground below is unused. The top floor is partitioned into two halves by the stairwell. On the left half of the lab is where most of the equipment and books are, while the right half consists mostly of tables with archeological dig ups of stunning sizes and complexity.

  There is also some kind of reddish X-ray light flooding that particular area of the lab. I suspect it is to preserve the artifacts. Come to think of it, the air here is clean and dry.

  I don’t hear any air conditioners, but I suspect there is one working on this floor. I also suspect there’s a miniature shield technology that shields the top floor from the lower level or any leak or cracks in the building to prevent the atmosphere here from being contaminated.

  On the left side of the floor, shelves are arranged in rows like in a library, with wide enough walkways between one another.

  The shelves take up most of the space towards the wall. The cluster of equipment occupies the center of the space between the shelves and the partition. Some of these equipment have stands of their own, while the rest are arranged on metal tables. There are three workstations, forming a perfect circle around the cluster of equipment.

  I see that the computers are hooked to a central processing device that’s connected to a network system. I follow the hardline that leads away to the opposite wall from where we are, climbs all the way up and exits the building through the wall. I suspect there’s some dish above.